Ubisoft has clarified a few details about the DRM in the upcoming PC version of Assassin's Creed 2, reassuring gamers that they don't need to worry about it because... Well, just don't worry about it.

A brief rundown to make sure everyone is caught up: In January, Ubisoft unveiled a DRM scheme that will require all its future PC releases to be connected to the internet and logged in to ubi.com in order to run. A few days ago, it was revealed that the scheme was somewhat worse than that: Games will have to be connected to Ubi's servers full-time while they're running and if the connection is broken for any reason, the game will come to a screeching halt. In case that's not quite infuriating enough, any progress made since the last checkpoint or auto-save will be lost, too.

The backlash, as you might expect, was swift and vicious. In response, Ubisoft attempted to clarify the plan to Ars Technica, assuring gamers that they really don't need to worry about the new DRM requirements, even though they're pretty much exactly as crazy as reported.

"As long as you do not quit the game, the game will continue to try to reconnect for an unlimited time [if the net connection drops]," a company rep said. "Once the game is able to reconnect, you will immediately be returned to your game."

"Where exactly you are reconnected in the game may differ from title to title," the rep continued. "Settlers 7 reconnects at the exact point where the connection was lost, AC2 reconnects you at the last checkpoint (and not the last auto save, as indicated in the CVG article). There are many checkpoints so you're back to the point where you got disconnected in no time."

The rep said players will only be dropped out of the game if the disconnection is "lengthy," whereas if it's only down for a couple of seconds, the game will simply pause and then resume once the connection is reestablished. Fluctuations in speed shouldn't be a problem either. "Our online services platform will require a maximum of 50kbps of available bandwidth, so even with the slowest connection, gameplay won't be affected," the rep added.

Still not buying it. Community backlash obviously doesn't mean much to Ubisoft, so the only way to tell them you don't like it is to, as they say, "vote with your wallet". I doubt it'll make a big impact because it's been proven again and again that people will eat their shit-twinkies anyway, but I'm not wasting my monies on this.

I think the worst thing is that this will (yes, will, not might) happen:

- Ubisoft puts shitty DRM on games to fight pirates.- Most gamers will eat their shit because they still like the game underneath it and it's "not a big deal" compared to other DRM.- Piracy continues, unaffected by the taste of shit on their games.- Ubisoft puts more shit on their games to fight pirates.- Most gamers will gladly shovel more shit down their own throats because it's not a big deal compared to previous flavors of shit.- Piracy continues, unaffected by the taste of shit on their games.- etc.

In short, refer to the boiling frog story but replace "boiling water" with "DRM" and "frog" with "gamers". Also add a boat full of pirates laughing in the face of everyone involved. That's pretty much how I see the future of DRM.

Still shit, and now we're going to have to hope the game we're playing is one of the ones that resumes from where we left off. PC Gamer interviewed them, and they even admitted it'd get cracked straight away.

The benefits are (this made me laugh) that you can install as many times as you like, on as many computers you like. I used to be able to do that with every game, when there was no such thing as DRM.

That's the reason why people pirate in the first place. And the people who don't have a 'net connection can't play the game, but they can hardly download it illegally either. If you don't have a connection no one's going to let you borrow theirs for the hours it takes to download a torrent.

I'd love a contact email address where we can send polite and informative emails to Ubisoft, telling them what we think. Maybe a member of staff working at the Escapist could provide this? Or contact Ubisoft who can then announce the address directly?

Its fun when you live in a place (like i do) where you ISP have a monopoly (its normally illegal, but tolerated for some reason) over the area and provides crap service and isnt cheap.

And, well, if that DRM thing remains, i wont ever buy stuff from UBI. Heck, i even stopped using Steam because of the extremelly slow connection and poor stability of the software.

THe more it goes.. in gaming, we end up owning our product less and less... its like a constant rental that may not always work as it is supposed to. And we pay quite a bit of money "to not own them".When did we accept that change? When was it considered standart practice to screw people over?

I'd love a contact email address where we can send polite and informative emails to Ubisoft, telling them what we think. Maybe a member of staff working at the Escapist could provide this? Or contact Ubisoft who can then announce the address directly?

Yeah, that's probably not going to happen. After the recent case with Sony's U.S. CEO guy's email, I highly doubt we're going to get any sort of contact information which would get it looked at by anyone up the food chain.

I'd love a contact email address where we can send polite and informative emails to Ubisoft, telling them what we think. Maybe a member of staff working at the Escapist could provide this? Or contact Ubisoft who can then announce the address directly?

You could try the contact info on the Ubisoft web site. Don't expect an answer, though.

I'd love a contact email address where we can send polite and informative emails to Ubisoft, telling them what we think. Maybe a member of staff working at the Escapist could provide this? Or contact Ubisoft who can then announce the address directly?

You could try the contact info on the Ubisoft web site. Don't expect an answer, though.

Thanks - tried one of them and no reply.

I have doubts on whether it was a human contact though. I think I'm going to send the same email to every address I can find on their site.

Andy Chalk:if it's only down for a couple of seconds, the game will simply pause and then resume once the connection is reestablished.

This annoys me more than nearly everything else, because it shows how draconian this truly is.

They could, you know, try to reconnect for a while and then pause the game, but no. It WILL pause the game even if the connection is out for a "couple of seconds". And this is one of the nicest thing it does.

This is complete bullshit.From now on, Ubisoft customers won't be buying their games, they will be buying the privilege of playing it under the specific circumstances that Ubisoft dictates.I will not be playing any Ubisoft games until this is over. It's not a boycott or anything, I just refuse to deal with this shit.

I think it's clear to everyone except ubisoft that this is about as pants on head crazy as DRM can get.

The only way it could get worse is if you had to register your rectum when you purchase a game, and the game will only play if you are sitting on a speculum/scanning device that ensures only your rectum is playing the game that you bought.

If a game is a single player game I don't see why you need to be connected to the internet. Sure most people have an internet connection but this kind of DRM forces you tobe online which while thier idea of constatly reconnecting is nice what if you go somewhere without internet or have a slow connection?

Well fuck. This has gone and broken my bullshitometer. Ubisoft, you can be expecting the repair bill!

All jokes aside, even if I do buy this, I won't install it as-is. I'll have to install the not-retarded pirate version, because my connection drops out all the time.

See that Ubi? You're DRM is so inconvenient, you're literally forcing me to get the pirated version, because your anti-piracy software majorly inconveniences innocent consumers, but doesn't affect pirates in the slightest.